#Romanian communism

[history-time-out]

​​Pitesti Human Experiment (1949-1951)

​​Pitesti Prison was built sometime between 1937-1941 and operated until 1977 in Romania. It was a political prison for students who were against the communist regime in Romania.

To see the timeline of communism in Romania you can click on the doc below.

​​The re-education that took place inside the prison was like no other. It was considered by some historians as the worst known acts towards humans on written record.

​​ “one of the most terrible experiments in dehumanization that our epoch has known”. Francois Furet ~ Historian

​​ "The most terrible act of barbarism in the modern world" Alexander Solzhenitsy

​The goal of reeducation was to make you hate the things you value and love the most in your life. The communists wanted to reeducate the most devout Christians(students) who were just as convicted to their faith as the communists were to advancing their party. They wanted them to become completely obedient to the party. It was an attack on their soul. In order to re-educate and change one’s personality. They would associate everything the students loved and valued with pure evil. The term “re-education” was cleverly named as it was not a lie, but so the man on the street believed it to be something it wasn’t.

“​​1949-1951 “The Pitesti Experiment”

​​The experiment was designed to reengineer the human soul by using methods of torture to destroy the prisoner’s psychologically so they would become absolutely obedient to the communist people’s republic. They would break bones, use red hot irons among other methods of physical torture. Methods of torture were also spiritually and psychologically sadistic. This was how they associated your faith to all things evil.

​​“The beginning of the unmaskings”

​​The rumor circulated, around the unmaskings, a day or two before their start, that on the night of December 10, Turcanu Eugen, Popa Alexandru, said Tanu, Martinus, Cantemir and three others whose name I did not find out, were taken out of prison and taken to a latch on the bank of the Arges, where they were told that that night they would form the team that will shoot all the legionary bosses in pitesti prison. Asked if they agreed, they all replied that they were ready for this deed.

They were then taken to the place where the execution was supposed to take place, they were distributed weapons and bullets, waiting for the victims to come. Those who directed this staging were convinced that Turcanu and his team were determined to execute any order they would have received. The first step was taken; all that remained was for the prepared tool to begin executing the plan.

​​Before December 10, they were brought to room "4 hospital", which I also mentioned, about 30 students, among the peaks, most of them legionnaires, as well as Turcanu's group: Popa Tanu, Martinus, Livinschi, Leonida, Prisäcaru, Cantemir, Virgil Bordeianu and some students from Câmpulung Moldovenesc.

​​Turcanu and his group were not discovered to have been re-educated, on the contrary, they were gossiping Bogdanovici and those who had joined thereeducationinSuceava, with the intention of dragging those in the room by the tongue, to see in what waters they were bathing.

​​As everything was directed, Turcanu caused a scandal and began the scuffle between his group and the other students. During the scuffle, a window broke. This was the signal for the administration to intervene. The door was knocked on and the next moment, director Dumitrescu and Lieutenant Marina, with about 30 guards, entered the room. Director and political officer Marina fired pistols into the ceiling, and the guards, with chimes, coming from the ox and centimetres, pounced on the students to make one of his cups.

​​It was no longer known if they were living people or corpses. It was not enough so, but those who were not educated in the corridor were taken out, and Turcanu's group and the guards began again to beat them so badly, that there were only puddles of blood on the ground.

​​The legionary students, chosen from among the peaks, were then taken to the death cells on the head of the T and tormented by Turcanu, over a year, with the most terrible and wild tortures.

​​Here are some names of these martyrs: Pop Cornel, Mägirescu Eugen, Popescu Aristotel, Pavaloaia Constantin, Patráscanu Nuti, Caziuc, Voinea Octavian, Soltuz Laurentiu, Juberian, Parizianu Gheorghe, Strächinariu Constantin, Dan Lucinescu etc. This explains the collapse of these comrades, with the exception of Parizianu. They cannot be judged: when you accuse someone, you must be in his position, and when it comes to torture, to honestly confess if you could have endured the supplication that the one you arrogate to your right to judge has endured.

​​As of this date, director Dumitrescu and Marina have not exercised their role; the one who was running the prison was Turcanu.

​​He had double keys to all the rooms and cells of the prison. I've seen him dozens of times, with the tuft of keys in his hand, authoritarian and fearsome, beating horror even in the guards.

​​The unmasking in Pitesti lasted from December 10, 1949 to September 1951. These young people who have been isolated, only God knows what sufferings they have endured, and they are also given the opportunity to commit suicide.

​​On December 10, 1949, the administration and the guards in Pitesti prison disappeared from the stage. The only actor who played the play was Turcanu. Only he locked and unlocked, only he gave orders to the guards. He and his masters, General Nicolskiand Colonel Zeller. Nothing moves without them knowing what's going on. On the night of December 10, 1949, many of us, from the other wards, heard noises, but we could not understand what was happening.

​​“Methods of torture”

​​The tortures were well dosed and ceased when the inmate was on the verge of death.

​​They were varied: beating, starvation, the obligation to sit in a fixed position 17 hours a day - the legs stretched horizontally, the hands on the ganunchi and the bust at 90 degrees - at the slightest movement the supervisor intervening with the bat; they were forced to drink urine, to eat the messes inthe tinetawhere they made their necessities; forced to drink water with a lot of salt and then let it dry out of thirst, and many others, invented by the sick mind of the torturers.

​​Those who gave in were obliged to make their

​​"unmasking", that is, to say everything they did not declare at the ancestry, to betray the inmates who helped them in prison or the guards who had a human behavior. Also, for the destruction to be complete, in front of everyone in the cell, everyone had to mock the memory of what was most important to him.

​​For example, someone loved his mother or wife very much. In front of everyone, he had to defame them, to make the most obscene and absurd statements against them. Anything that was bright and good in the consciousness of the one who was still had to be defamed and filled with mud.

​​

​​“For the theological students”

​​The theological and godly students - the "mystical bandits", as they were called - were forced to apostate, to deny God, blaspheming everything related to the Christian faith. On Christmas or Easter, on the songs of carols or the Prophet, they were forced to sing texts with obscenities and indescribable insults against the Savior and His Mother. At the same time, they were forced to make blasphemous processions. To perform

​​"liturgies" with the miseries in the matter of necessities and then to "share" with them. Some were "baptized" by immersion in the hardaul with feces. I think these are enough to figure out the Satanism of re-education.

​​After the inmate made his "unmasking", in order to prove that he had re-educated himself, he had to, in his turn, become a torturer and convince another, to deny himself "of all the bourgeois rot" and to adopt the communist ideology. This led, under terror, to a real brainwashing. The tortured ones, no longer able to endure the continuous torments, having no possibility of suicide, being closely surpavegheati, gave in and turned into robots with a hardened heart, becoming of the victims, the horses. Even after they arrived reeducated they did not escape terror, because at the slightest sign of solidarity with the tormented, they passed again through the torture mill. Thus, living in a permanent terror, suspecting each other, they collapsed continuously with no possibility of recovery.

​​

​​“One last satanic method”

​​Another satanic aspect was that everything you hid and represented a fulcrum on the path of inner collapse tormented you so much that you asked yourself to expose yourself, feeling through this a relief, as after a confession, although these confessions were used against you. A very strange process took place, producing mutations in the personality of the tortured one, who came to deny the previous concepts and to adopt what Turcanu imposed on him, with the conviction that it does him a good. In this process of brainwashing "his mind is enlightened" he lived something like a relief, he "understood" everything he had rejected before and he started with all conviction to bring the others to the same stage of 'enlightenment'. For us, who have not gone through such demonic states, things are incomprehensible.

​​Most of them tortured others being themselves under the empire of terror, without the mutations we talked about above. The system was designed so that under continuous torture were very rare the cases of those who resisted to the end, generally making compromises, bigger or smaller, according to the structure and resistance of each one.

​​

Here some good resources for more information on the Pitesti Prison. I plan on making several blog posts on this topic and on Romanian Communism.

- The first time I had heard about the Pitesti Prison was during the summer of 2021. A friend of mine recommended “The Martyrmade Podcast” and the episode titled The Anti Humans.

- “The Anti Humans” book written by Dumitru Bacu. Bacu was Romanian born in Greek territory, went to Romania for his university education and there became a member of the anti-Communist organization that flourished in that nation before and during the tragic and fratricidal Second World War. He was a political prisoner in Pitesti Prison and this book is his firsthand experiences of what he went through.

[nameinconcept-blog]

Culture in the Bukovina Region

"Music is played, laughter is heard, dances are whirling…" "It is impossible to imagine a folk holiday or a wedding in Bukovina without an unrestrained hopak, arkan, or hutsulka."

"In Bucovina, there is no wedding or other party without popular music, happy songs, and festive dances."

"In the Bukovyna region, almost everyone is a musician, singer, and dancer."

"The colors of Bukovyna - is it possible to describe them? They are in the festive clothes of dancers at a folklore festival, and in the works of artists who are in love with this region."

"The colors of Bucovina can be compared with something - They also adorn the clothes of the dancers at the folk festival, and the creations of the artists who loved this land."

"Having visited Bukovyna, immerse your eyes in the colors of folk clothing, embroidered pillows and towels, precious Easter eggs, and the skill of making wooden dishes."

"Being in Bucovina, you will be captivated by the wealth of colors on the folk port, on the pillows and towels, painted eggs, on the masterfully inlaid wooden dishes."

From the book "Буковина" published by "Art". 1989

[grenade-maid]

Signalis, Authority, and History

There's a level of nuance to how Signalis presents the violence of the authority of the nation that doesn't call attention to itself but which I really appreciate. Which is basically just, all the officers and cops and spies who make life hell for people like the Gestalt mine workers, Ariane, and the Itou family--we get little glimpses into who they are in Adler and Kolibri's diaries and despite the propaganda and the authoritative tone they take in official communications, for the most part they don't seem to actually be particularly invested in the hard line of national ideology. They uphold it though, viciously, both because things were worse under imperial rule (we don't get hard details on what it was like but it's mentioned in passing enough that I believe it) and because they're scared that if they don't they will be decommissioned and easily replaced. They are literally stamped out of a production line after all. There's a subtext of well, if I don't do it my replacement will anyway and I'm not trying to die so what's the point of rocking the boat?

I think Kolibri stands out to me most clearly on this because in communications from the block warden regarding Ariane there is emphasis put on how it is unacceptable and suspicious that she should be so interested and invested in art and literature that does not serve the purpose of furthering the goals of the nation. But we know that Kolibris themselves are bookworms, Adlers are fiends for stimulating experiences, and both get miserable FAST when deprived of art and puzzles and entertainment and hobbies. Y'know, just like anyone. Far be it from being a paragon of The Nation only interested in productive labor, we are reminded that the block warden, too, hates this shitty town and wants to transfer but is denied. They're hypocrites, but not monsters, nor brainwashed puppets of the state.

The monstrousness at play is not contained within any particular subset of evil individuals, or even an inherent universal force of evil contained in the broad notion of The Nation. There is no cosmic evil force that makes them all do these things to each other. The monstrousness is within the social systems, the mechanisms of how authority perpetuates on a structural procedural level, held in place by fear and tangible threats of violence, each link in the chain restraining the next through those threats out of fear that if they don't, then they'll be next. Regardless how many, if any, of those people in this chain are true dogmatic hardliners, they must act as such because failing to do so opens them up to danger.

Here then I think of the quote that is so prominent, "Great holes secretly are digged where earth’s pores ought to suffice, and things have learnt to walk that ought to crawl", from Lovecraft's The Festival. This is not just a chilling abstract visual that conveniently evokes a mineshaft-- in Lovecraft's story, this line refers to worms which ate the decomposing bodies of wizards whose wretched souls had remained after death, complete with the terrible powers they gained through contracts with demons. Those worms inherited both their power, and also the evil. The Nation, despite having overthrown the Empire, is built on imperial technology, in particular Replikas and bioresonance. So too, then, we can imply that The Nation inherited with those things some of the monstrousness of The Empire as well. There is no end of history, nor clean break with the past, no matter how violently it may seem to be rejected. That which remains from the past--and something inevitably always does--creates the present.

This is a game that is not shy about evoking East Germany. And I think all of this provides a sophisticated picture of repressive authority that we rarely see in fiction of the English speaking world, especially in games. The year the S23 incident takes place is notably 84, but, frankly, I find this to be more compelling and illustrative than 1984 (and I'm a librarian and have taught English classes so I get to say that). Orwell, let's be honest, presents a fairly one dimensional picture of authority, where people seize power and wield it against others out of seeming mustache twirling evil or malice.

Here though we get a more humanistic view. Authority did not come from nowhere and is not wielded arbitrarily out of gleeful cruelty or mindless brainwashed allegiance. People aren't "just following orders". Individuals have rich inner lives. They make decisions, and those decisions are based in the context they're in. Even the decision to carry repressive tools of the past into the present is a decision that was made strategically with the big picture in mind. Nobody woke up and decided to be evil that day. Everyone operates on self interest, and, we must assume, an earnest desire for things to get better. Even the [spoiler] program which served as an inspirational demonstration of The Nation's power, you can imagine the chain of officers and bureaucrats who genuinely wanted the people of the nation to believe in the future, to confidently trust that everyone was working together towards something great and beautiful. And, through a long chain of those people who couldn't say "No" without being decommissioned, we ended up with something unbelievably cruel.

We get to know Adler and Kolibri and the other officers not to say well they're human too, maybe it wasn't so bad that they condemned all those people to agonizing suffering, but to remember that if we keep looking for true monsters we will not find them. There are no monsters and there are no demons. There are only people making decisions. A better world is possible. A better world, where Adler is just a paper pusher who does puzzles after work instead of signing papers to authorize torture, where Kolibris are librarians instead of spies and cops, where EULEs can gossip and play piano and ARARs can do maintenance on facilities that don't contain torture rooms, is one that would not have led to the Ariane and Elster's tragic cycle and ultimate end.

Authority and its attendant cruelty is not contained, radiating forth from The Great Revolutionary and Her Daughter, it is within the social systems of control. When those two women die, that cruelty will continue so long as those social systems continue. Like Lovecraft's worms, no matter how long dead the evil of the past is, so long as it continues to be fed upon, that evil will not only remain, but evolve into something new in the present. A better world can't be achieved through the death of the old world alone, even if violent overthrow is warranted. There is no end of history. There is no clean break from the past.

"Men make their own history, but they do not make it as they please; they do not make it under self-selected circumstances, but under circumstances existing already, given and transmitted from the past. The tradition of all dead generations weighs like a nightmare on the brains of the living."

Karl Marx, The Eighteenth Brumaire of Louis Bonaparte

[bruciemilf]

Hey your social media au is funny but why'd you have Dick speak Romanian? Wouldn't it make more sense to have him speak Romani?

I’m more familiar with the Romanian language since that’s what I see in headcanons!! From what I’ve seen, his Romani heritage isn’t developed enough into canon so I could look into it to be absolutely sure. So, I’m sticking to European Romani Dick for me!!

[lem0nademouth]

guys. guys. are you seeing what i’m seeing.

the romanian flag is honestly the thing that gets me the most bc romania is still considered a developing nation due to the destruction caused by the USSR. the romanian revolution happened 35 years ago.

also she has a mao zedong memorabilia collection bc what else is new anyway can people pls stop being Like This

[probablyvampirerpgideas]

Make a Vampire character who just really sucks at hiding the fact that they're a vampire. Like it's really fucking obvious dude, no one is being fooled here, you look like one those feratu.

[romanianblr]

romanian anti-communist revolution, 1989 a student tends a small shrine in the middle of the main street outside bucharest university while an older woman watches. the shrine is a cross where people have laid flowers and bread for the dead.

[evojxc]

please vote for Elena Lasconi.

[icecreamwithjackdaniels]

"I believe that poetry, as a genre, is in a state of disarray. It has lost its object or what we believe to be its object: communication. Hence its lack of resonance: words fall into people's souls like into bags of cotton. Each of us is a kind of cotton bag for the impressions of others (and barrels of powder only for our own impressions)."

— Marin Sorescu, Insomnia, 1971

[nopiedraws]

Oh yea btw ! Coms sheet !

☆ will draw anything but nsfw and heavy gore

☆ I can only use paypal n kofi for now

(bizum if youre from spain)

☆ price is negotiable

By default background is a +15€ but it can vary ! Negotiable

And I do these textured portraits for about 20€ !

Thank you !! ☆

[caitlynmeow]

The girlies, like most Europeans, know a number of languages.

They speak Romanian, English, Italian, French and Latin. Alcina is very serious about this, as her daughters’ education is very important to her. It is the one thing she will never budge on; her daughters are going to be well versed in many languages and read different literatures in their respective language.

Of course, she will not limit them to that, if any of her daughters wants to learn an additional language, she can go right ahead and do that because she will always have her mama’s blessings to do so.

[drum-cu-naluci]

Romanian revolutionary [1989]

[gorillaxyz]

i was talking to rpf girl about dyke nixon today. WE TALKED SO MUCH ABOUY EVERUTHING shes awesome... sigh... i wish she was more into the idea of Going Out Side. like i understand being a hermit but come onn... play with me

we talked about girls we liked today😏 and she rold me shes never been in a relationship etc etc and didnt know what to expect or what she even wanted. but we did talk abt the girls we like on the telly... and she watches like house of dragon stuff AND SHES NUMBER 1 SUPPORT WOMENS WRONGS i love her actually shes so me... i showed her pictures of the ladies i like and i struggled breathing I ACTUALLY GO CRAZY LOOKING AT BEAUTIFUL WOMEN. but yeah... we talked so much... like 3 hours... shes awesome and so so cute... and she likes the ginger ladies😏 SOOOOO TRUEEEE GIRL HIGH FIVE

[barnbridges]

every time i hear someone be like "im eastern european" and then they never talk about their home country or culture with any sort of pride or belonging im like are you actually an american bot thanks

[mysimplethoughtsputonpaper]

Balkan childhood (part 1)

[slugslide]

​Card game printed by Întreprinderea Poligrafică Banat